Orphans
by Soul of Ashes
Summary: The exhausted hours afterward, and their souls naked and tired.
1. Chapter 1

Agents of the United States, working alongside the BSAA, collected them from the scorching hot wreckage of the lift. The earth's violent explosion had ejected them into open air - and they'd had no other choice but to cling to it and each other for dear life as they were helplessly given to the whims of gravity and momentum, spinning out of control until they came to a stop.

That's how the BSAA found Jake Muller and Sherry Birkin - exhausted, cold and wet, burned from the lava. They both had suffered numberless injuries. One look from his ice blue eyes almost scared the infantry away. But Sherry smiled and told them they were more or less all right before just submitting themselves to their assistance.

They were taken someplace very secure in via air-lift, but one would have thought they were about to be taken down by AA ballista, the way they clung to each other, wide-eyed and exhausted - Jake's long arm around her shoulders and holding her, while she seemed only too happy to bury her face against his chest - like two wayward orphans seeking desperately the comfort they so needed in each other.

"Jake," Sherry said quietly at one point. "Jake, I'm so tired."

His eyes closed and he let out a long, shuddering breath. "No kidding, Super Girl. So am I."

Someone gave them a blanket and, after managing to work around the seat belts of their helicopter, they found a comfortable position to sleep in. No one would have said that just six or so months ago, they had been complete strangers. His battered, bruised fingers slowly slid along her shoulders and came to rest against her pale throat, feeling her pulse as it beat beneath them.

-

As much as it pained them to be woken up only after an hour, they were lead by a patient young man inside from the helicopter pad. They kept the blanket - heads ducked down, his arm still locked around her, blinking against the whipping wind and dust.

Inside, it was another story. They looked like they didn't belong amidst the clean beige-colored carpet or the neat paintings of light houses with inspirational quotes on the walls. They were layered in the filth and grime and blood and sweat of their trials, and of all the things they had gone without, all the ameneties of simple civilian life, they both agreed unanimously that a shower was something they would both enjoy very much. They were permitted as much time as they needed to wash, to recover, to recuperate.

They were inseperable. The bathroom was big and cozy. Some clean clothes waited for them, neatly folded. They stood in a moment of exhausted silent indecision before they spoke at the same time.

"You go first-"

"-head on in there."

Jake paused. "Ladies first." Then he turned his back politely, discovering that every muscle in his body was stiff. He limped to the wall, leaning against it with the intention to stand and wait. He didn't want to leave her alone. And for some reason, Sherry Birkin didn't seem to protest his presence at all. He closed his eyes and biting back whimpers of discomfort, peeled away her clothes.

He was almost asleep standing up when he heard her voice.

"I can't get this. Need a hand."

He shifted, eyes flicking open and immediately to her, alarmed by her tone. She stood with her arms crossed over her chest, head bowed. She turned around, and it was like China all over again - every pale, frail slope of her body exposed. But she wore a bra - a pale damp contraption of bondage, in his opinion, though a necessary evil for the kind of running she'd been doing for so long. He crossed toward her, and made his fingers work apart the snaps until the garment slid from her shoulders.

His breath caught. She hugged her arms to her chest, stepping forward awkwardly. "You need any other help?"

"Just come in with me." Sherry's head was bowed, her voice strangely echoed in the small bathroom space. "I don't want stand in there by myself... you know? Does it matter?"

"No... Guess not," he said, head cocked with a gentle smile. He pulled off his shirt and groaned. "I'll be sure to keep my eyes to myself."

Her voice sounded tired and mournful. "I don't care if you look at me, Jake." She lowered her arms, letting the straps slide down from her arms, hang off her hands and to the floor. She stepped over to the shower and shivered when she fidgeted at the knobs, one arm crossing over her chest and cupping her breast as she tried not to feel the chill. As soon as the first unheated spray touched her, there was an unflattering squeak. Her teeth started chattering at once, and in her nakedness she looked all the more pathetic and scared and tired than before, alone in a strange bathroom in another strange place - what else could Jake feel for her but pity and empathy?

She stepped back, and she watched as the water steamed and heated the bathroom. The tiles began to sweat. At his groan, she turned and gasped softly, seeing the shirt sticking to a layer of scabbed-over scrapes all along his back, distorting his skin with painful clarity.

"Oh, Jake..."

"Is it bad, doc?" he groaned, offering her a cocked grin.

"It's... the water's not going to feel so great on any of this." She bit her lip, looking away as he dropped the trousers and kicked them aside.

"I hate to say this but if you haven't noticed, I haven't been feeling so great to begin with. A little more pain won't make any difference, will it?"

Her concern broke his heart. She sniffled. "Jake... I hope this is the end. I hope this is over." Her eyes brimmed. She clenched her teeth, and a swollen, bleeding exhaustion began to boil over. Everything burned and hurt, and now that there was this peaceful moment to reflect, to come down from their nearly-constant rush of adraneline, she was feeling it emotionally wreck her. "You look so awful."

"Gee. Thanks a- Oh, sweetie, don't cry."

Sherry was sobbing. Inconsolable. And they were standing there, just the both of them in the skin they were born in. Jake stared at her helplessly, and the longer she cried in front of him with his eyes watching her like that, the more wretched she felt.

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry I didn't protect you better." She covered her face now - finding it more shameful to reveal the volume of her emotional distress than her own body. She felt as if she needed to cry, horribly, badly... as if she had to hollow herself out with this ugly act, pour herself out onto the floor and wash herself down the drain.

She was simply exhausted and over-tired and sore.

Jake found her not ugly at all. He saw her whole soul bare and lovely in all that crying. He stepped closer and put his arms around her. She pressed her face to his chest and shook with harder, shameless sobs, as if the touch of his skin triggered the final breaking of something holding it all back. The tough agent girl act was over now. There was no need to keep in character.

He held her naked beside the shower with all the steam. He felt oddly empty, as if the tears had yet to come to the surface, but with every sob she gave him, he felt as if he could cry just as hard. He squeezed her to him, stroking her hair.

"Shhh... It's all right..." He said comforting things, soft things - other languages, words she didn't know that sounded soft in all the right places. He didn't know what else he could do for her. But it was enough. Eventually she stopped crying. He brushed her hair from her face.

"Come on, Super Girl. We smell like horses and I feel like shit. Let's get in there and clean off, okay?"

"O-Okay." As fragile as a deer, she stepped into the shower first. She hardly needed to adjust the temperature. She stood beneath the spray and hugged herself, turned around, let the pounding water assault her back. She would weep and be silent in turns. She whimpered quietly beneath his gaze.

"Are you ready?" she sniffled, stepping aside to find that there was plenty of room for them both.

And he stepped in and he turned his back and growled out his pain when the water scoured his skin. Before, it was hard to tell whether some of the marks on his skin were bruises or just dirt. Now, however... it became clear that a large portion of his body was quite badly battered. Sherry began to soap up a wash cloth with a bar of soap.

As naturally as if they'd done this their whole lives, he let Sherry wash him as gently as possible. She knew every cut, every bullet graze, ever new scar because she had witnessed them all when they happened - cleaned them out afterward when they were still fresh and bleeding. She knew his body well now. He leaned his shoulder against the wall and let her work, content to just hang his head and breathe and be still while the wash cloth gently sponged away dried blood.

She washed his hair gently - scrubbing at his short hair, working out all the grease and dirt. She rubbed at his neck, gently at his shoulders, her feeling her face heating up as she reached around his wide chest and rubbed the soapy cloth against him. He watched her with tired patience until she gulped, and continued downward.

She got down on her knees, and she washed his legs, and his feet, scrubbing harder here and there, and once in awhile she'd hear him grunt.

"Sorry," she quickly responded, every time.

He didn't reply. His eyes were closed and he merely stood - sliding his feet apart so she could along the insides of his legs as well.

The water ran dark for fifteen minutes until it finally ran clear, spiralling and churning down the drain. He helped her stand up - she slipped on the tile and leaned against him, blushing for an instant before she gained her feet. She handed him the wash cloth. Then she turned her back and daintily bent her legs to get the shampoo for her hair as opposed to bending over.

He didn't watch her. Instead he saw to his private cleanliness and scrubbed rather viciously before he simply basked in the heat of the shower, waiting for her to finish.

"You're beautiful," he said quietly, eyes still closed. "That's why... I try not to look at you too much."

Sherry didn't know what to say to that. She slowed and stopped working at the shampoo in her hair, turning only to look at him.

"Thank you."


	2. Chapter 2

The bathroom cooled. Quiet fractured by the dripping faucet, the two orphaned survivors slid out of the shower wrapped in soft ivory white towels, scrubbed clean and pink of their worldly filth. Sherry clutched the towel closed with the kind of half-hearted effort that only the truly exhausted could dredge - a narrow slip of pale thigh exposed all the way to her hip. But she moved so slowly and delicately, the fabric was hardly disturbed to reveal anything else. Jake clasped the towel around his waist and they both eyed the sad pile of clothing on the benches that used to be worn by them, beside neatly folded items laid out for them, their factory-pressed wrinkles still painfully visible like they had scars of their own.

Jake cleared his throat, pursed his lips, and turned his back to Sherry and the clothing, standing and waiting with a nagging weariness that threatened to sit him down. Sherry quickly took the hint, dropping her towel. The pants (Lei's brand jeans, tacky embroidered swirl pattern on the back pockets) were still loose on her but there was a cloth belt to cinch it tighter. The shirt was big and longsleeve and more importantly, it was thick and warm. She realized these must have been her sizes before China and Edonia. Before Jake. She'd lost weight.

She crossed her arms over her chest, her sore feet thanking her for the thick fluffy socks but not the sneakers. They weren't her size at all. She stepped past Jake to the door, feeling tickles of wetness from her hair inch down the back of her neck like icicles. She was suddenly cold, in spite of the clothes.

"Right," Jake sighed as she faced the door, her back turned. Politeness had a way of trying to impose itself where it wasn't necessary, but they had had enough of a dose of each other's bodies beneath the spray of the shower head. She stood and listened to him sigh, listened to his breath hitch as he shoved his feet through the pants, secure the buttons. She winced when she could hear him pull the shirt down carefully over his skin and all its surprise hot-spots. Scorched by magma. Through Hell and back.

"Ready?"

"Yeah."

Jake found himself hesitant. Antsy. He was looking for his nine-oh-nine, although they both remembered leaving their weapons with the men. Jake was resentful that he'd given them up so easily, even if he was too tired to give a shit.

"It's okay," she suddenly said. "Because we're together, at least." She took his hand, worming her soft clean pink fingers between his.

—

The hallway felt too bright suddenly. Or maybe it was just hard on their eyes. They squinted and glared and winced at the group of people waiting for them.

"We know you've both been through a lot," an older man began, grizzly, salt and pepper hair, and important looking. "But you don't have to worry about being debriefed or anything such as that. Believe me when I say you're very safe here now. There are guards everywhere so you aren't to worry. This young lady will show you to your rooms and you'll be able to get a good night's rest."

Those were the magic words. Jake could see it in Sherry's eyes. Good night's rest.

Did such a thing even exist for people like them?

Her eyes watered a little. She didn't care how it looked. She didn't even care who would talk. She turned and buried her face in Jake's chest, and tried to smell the scent that was still him and not the smell of the body wash or the sick New Shirt smell. She hid her face against him and just waited to be guided wherever.

So Jake walked along with her, following the small young petite woman in a soldier's uniform, who was probably only an active nurse of some kind. Down a few hallways from the bathrooms, there were rows of doors, a gathering area, and then the bedrooms - rooms like the Hampton. Sumptuous beds, pillows fluffed. Clean beds.

Jake almost moaned.

"If you want a wake-up call, you just let one of the boys guarding down the halls know, okay?"

"We won't," Sherry said. Either we won't let them know or we won't need a wake-up call - either way, they wouldn't get one and they didn't want one. Sherry leaned into Jake one last time, her arm solid and almost painful around his waist. Then slowly, she began to let go and step into her own room. Her blue eyes huge, she looked up at him and hugged the doorframe for a second, holding the door ajar with her hip.

"Goodnight."

He longed already. She felt good holding onto him. It felt right. Now she was there, and not here, and his skin felt cold. He could see her shaking still.

Because the woman was watching, maybe that was the reason he backed off and Sherry shut her door. He walked down to his door, opened it, and found himself floating to his bed. His head was on the pillow before the door clicked shut and locked out the world.

—

Tossing and turning. He heard it through the wall. But if there was a war waging on outside these hallways, it was worlds away beyond hearing. But her, he could still hear. He heard the blankets rumple and whisper as she turned over, and over. Or at least he imagined it.

He couldn't sleep after thirty minutes. She hadn't slept at all.

He rolled to his back, winced at once with immediate regret, and stared at the formless darkness above his bed.

"Sherry," he said softly. The tossing stopped, as if she could hear.

Suddenly he stood up, putting his bare feet on the cool carpet. The room was dark with just the faintest of light inching in from beneath the door. He used it to light his way. His new shoes were next to it - indiscernable unfamiliar lumps that didn't look at all like his old boots.

He put his handle on the door to open it. He waited a heartbeat or two, wondering if there would be guards stationed out there now that they had fallen asleep.

His door knocked. He swore, jerking back form the door. It was such a light knock - as if she assumed he was already asleep and she couldn't bring herself to snare him from whatever dreamland he could get but she was too tired and desperate and lonely to lie back in her room and do nothing.

Instead, he was opening the door and looking at her. She looked small and wane and child-like standing there, her hand hovering hesitantly before she dropped it to toy with the hem of her shirt. There were tears brimming again. He saw her shaking with all her effort to hold them all. It wasn't working for much longer.

"I'm sorry, I just wa—I just couldn't sleep—" Her voice broke. He grabbed her and pulled her in. "—alone and—"

"Shhh." He stroked the back of her head, and weaved back a step with her, letting her cling to him in that way she needed. Her whole body was shaking.

"—it's cold—"

"Come here. Shhh. It's okay." He folded her close, and they moved the few steps to the bed. He lifted the covers and let her in. She wasn't wearing those awfuls shoes. She stopped only to take off her jeans and slide beneath the covers in that overlong, long-sleeved shirt. She was hesitant to leave the warmth he gave her. But she slid beneath the covers, and swooned around her tears to find that it was almost unpleasant and deliciously warm beneath the thick, downy blankets.

Jake slid in underneath her, lying on his side - and she faced him. He pulled her close, and her forehead pressed against his chest, muffling the quiet little sobs. She recovered quicker now than in the bathroom shower though - growing still and gentle, her breathing deep.

Lying across from each other, watching each other. Jake did nothing but rest his hand on her hip beneath her shirt - feeling the soft, warm bare skin rise and fall with each breath. She was trembling because he was touching her. She had her hands tucked up beneath her chin for awhile almost as if in prayer… but she moved them now. She brushed her fingers over his cheekbones, back toward his ears, under his jaw. She saw his jaw muscle pop a little as he shifted his head to lie on the pillow, and there was a drowsy, mesmerized quality in his pale antarctic eyes.

Finally her fingertips followed the narrow, numb track of scar tissue along his cheek. Back and forth, never straying from the clear distinct path beneath her touch. She felt that, as she did this, his hand on her hip was moving. To her waist, and all around the flatness of her lower back. Her spine arched instinctively, and she sucked in a breath, her hand frozen above the scar on his face.

She thought she would die choking on the apology for daring to touch this hurt and hallowed place. Someone bad had hurt him deeply here. Hurt him terribly.

"It's okay," he whispered. He wanted to touch her scars, too. But hers weren't just in one place. They were everywhere beneath her perfect tender skin. Her eyes were wide, watching his face. He pulled her closer across the mattress until their thighs were touching.

Her hand rested along his neck and shoulder then - and beneath her ring finger, his pulse drummed steadily and sedately in a rhythmic staccato.

_Touch me. Please just touch me. _

Her eyes said it. Her lower lip when she bit it. Then at last when she looked down, staring at his throat instead of eyes that could pierce her very existence.

She stroked his neck slowly, her thumb gliding over his pulse, silent yearning. He caressed her, his hand gentle beneath the soft cotton, as if he had known all along how she needed to be touched. How she needed to be kissed, and soothed, and her hands found his shoulders to pull him down to her, and close the fragile seal of breath her mouth made.

They tangled with the tiredness plaguing them, but he kissed her and touched her everywhere he could reach in that harmless manner, searching her everywhere for a place that he hadn't soothed save one - that was not for tonight.

They touched and kissed and sighed until Sherry had fallen half-asleep in his arms. The chill in the air was far away now. The wintry Edonia was a distant and uncomfortable recollection. It was just this bed, and the pillow under their heads, and the breath exchanged between them and the press of their limbs as they fit together. Exhaustion crashed over like fallout from a nuclear bomb in the darkness of space - devestating and completely soundless.


End file.
